Sunday, September 20, 2009

Before anybody gets indignant over the spiritual implications of making soup on Sunday, let me say this: You can talk to tomatoes all you want about the Sabbath, but if they're ready, they're ready.

So today we made soup. Tomato soup. Almost entirely of home-grown ingredients. We had tomatoes from our garden and from Michelle's sister's garden, plus our garden onions and carrots. The peppers and celery had to come from the store, as we don't have room for celery and we grew only green peppers this summer.

What a year for tomatoes this was. This is the first time since Michelle and I got married that we got more than a dozen tomatoes out of our garden. And this year we got loads. Bowl after bowl -- we only accepted those from Michelle's sister because we wanted to make more tomato soup.

And what soup it is. Lovely soup, not the condensed stuff out of a can, but stuff that actually has flavor not remnicient of Spaghetti-Os. Good tomato, with that hint of onion and celery. Soooooo very good. Last year, we only made seven bottles. This year, sixteen of them, plus one ready to eat in the fridge. Can't wait.

Other news: Had a minor electrical victory yesterday. I was cutting a piece of plywood on the table saw when the saw cut out. I thought we'd tripped a breaker in the shed, and indeed we had, but it would not stay on or off. So I replaced the receptacle where I had the saw plugged in, but it still wouldn't work. So I yanked the breaker and replaced it. Voila. I'm happy I didn't have to call anyone in on that one.

REALLY? AS IF IT WERE SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.

“Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little. . .”

YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.

“So you can believe the big ones?”

YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.

“They’re not the same at all!”

YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET – Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME . . . RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.